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As she gears up to host Sunday night’s 94th Academy Awards alongside Amy Schumer and Regina Hall, Wanda Sykes recently recalled rocking the mic at the 2009 White House Correspondents’ dinner.
“I was just thrown into the fire,” Sykes told PEOPLE of that night. “I had no idea the magnitude of people who would be in that room.”
“At the Correspondents’ dinner, I shushed the First Lady,” the comedienne went onto recall. “Michelle Obama was sitting right next to me, and I’m going over my material, my jokes, and I’m focused on prep, and she’s trying to make conversation. And I just gave her a look like, ‘Woman, I’m working over here! What are you doing? Pipe down.'”
With the pressure of that night in mind, Sykes laughed and said, “I think I’ll be okay in this role,” when talking about her gig at this year’s Oscars.
The most notable 2022 Academy Award nominations include numerous nods towards King Richard in various categories, Questlove’s Summer of Soul in the Documentary category and Coming 2 America in the Makeup And Hairstyling category.
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King Richard star Will Smith gave a teary-eyed speech back in February, as he accepted a SAG Award for the Male Actor in a Leading Role category.
“That may have been one of the greatest moments of my career just now,” the actor candidly said. “Because my name was called for King Richard sitting next to Venus Williams.”
The film unpacks the determination and passion Richard Williams had as he trained two of his young Black daughters, Venus and Serena Williams, to later become titans within their white-dominated sport, tennis.
Smith’s nomination at the Academy Awards this Sunday in the Best Actor category marks the first time the actor’s been up for an Oscar in 15 years. His competition includes Javier Bardem (Being the Ricardos), Benedict Cumberbatch (The Power of the Dog), Andrew Garfield (tick, tick… BOOM!) and Denzel Washington (The Tragedy of Macbeth).
Taking place at Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre, the 2022 Oscars will air on Sunday at 8 p.m. on ABC.
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